MPA News
World Conservation Congress Brings Many Developments for MPA Practitioners: New Tools, Publications, Principles
Multiple new tools, publications, principles, and guidelines to aid MPA practitioners were announced at the IUCN World Conservation Congress (WCC), held 5-14 October in Barcelona, Spain. Convened every four years to discuss solutions to conservation challenges, the WCC produced a consensus statement on speeding up MPA designations, new web-based tools for the field, a revised definition for the term protected area, several guidebooks on planning and management, and a set of principles for governing the high seas. More than 8000 delegates attended from governments, NGOs, businesses, and academia. In terms of its policy-making aspects, the WCC is unlike any other…
Huge No-Take Area Proposed for Australian Coral Sea
Australia’s portion of the Coral Sea should be designated as a giant no-take marine reserve, according to a new campaign led by the Pew Environment Group (a US-based NGO), several Australian marine scientists, and former Australian Navy officials. The proposed Australian Coral Sea Heritage Park would stretch from the offshore boundary of the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park in northeast Australia to the edge of the nation’s maritime boundaries with Papua New Guinea, the Solomon Islands, and New Caledonia. It would cover roughly one million km2, making it the largest no-take marine reserve in the world. The proposal is available…
MPA Perspective: A Role for Marine Conservation Agreements
Editor’s note: The following essay offers lessons from a learning workshop on marine conservation agreements presented in October at the World Conservation Congress in Barcelona, Spain. John Claussen is director of the Conservation and Community Investment Forum. Eduard Niesten is director of the Conservation Economics Program for Conservation International (CI). Dick Rice is chief economist for CI. Jay Udelhoven is senior policy advisor for the Global Marine Team of The Nature Conservancy. Patricia Zurita is senior director of the Conservation Stewards Program for CI. By John Claussen, Eduard Niesten, Dick Rice, Jay Udelhoven, and Patricia Zurita Over the past several…
Notes & News
Greenpeace dumps boulders in MPA to discourage trawling Greenpeace activists in August placed more than 300 large granite stones in an MPA in the German EEZ of the North Sea in an attempt to discourage bottom trawling activity there. Each boulder, weighing 2-3 metric tons, was dropped from a chartered ship in the region of Sylt Outer Reef, designated four years ago as a Special Area of Conservation under the EU Habitats Directive (www.habitatmare.de/en/intro.php). Bottom trawling is not regulated under the site’s current rules. Greenpeace wants the European Commission (which sets EU fishing policy) to ban the practice there, and…
What Will MPA Planning and Management Be Like in 10 Years?: MPA Practitioners Forecast the Future
This month marks the 100th issue of MPA News. From the publication of our first issue nearly a decade ago, the field of marine protected areas has changed in significant ways. Some of these changes have been technological – including new, sophisticated software to help plan MPA networks – and others financial, such as the increased use of endowments to fund sites. The measurement of MPAs’ effectiveness has emerged as a widely accepted part of management. And, perhaps most importantly, governments worldwide have agreed on the need for representative systems of MPAs, and set deadlines to meet that goal. However,…
US President Bush Considers Major New MPAs for Central and Western Pacific
US President George W. Bush has directed his administration to assess whether large marine areas under US jurisdiction in the central and western Pacific should receive greater protection, such as through designation as MPAs. In the central Pacific, this includes the waters surrounding Johnston Atoll; Howland, Baker, and Jarvis Islands; Kingman Reef; Palmyra Atoll; Wake Island; and Rose Atoll. In the western Pacific, the area includes waters around the northern islands of the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, including parts of the Mariana Trench. The areas in question are enormous. The central Pacific areas, for example, total more than…
MPA Perspective Managing the “Nemo Effect” of Globalization in the Reef Fish Community
Editor’s note: Juan Carlos Huitron Baca is subdirector of Isla Mujeres-Cancún National Park in Mexico. By Juan Carlos Huitron Baca Isla Mujeres and Cancún, on the Yucatan Peninsula of Mexico, are popular destinations for tourists from all around the world. Development of the area began in the 1970s with a project to create the infrastructure for a massive tourism resort. In 1996 a national marine park – Isla Mujeres-Cancún National Park – was decreed for the protection of the coral reefs used by visitors. The main threats to these reefs were sewage, fishing, and uncontrolled underwater activities. After 12 years,…
MPA Perspective: A New Framework for Managing Impacts of Structures in Declared Fish Habitat Areas
Editor’s note: The authors of this essay – Mary Lawrence, Dave Sully, John Beumer, and Dawn Couchman – are all with the Queensland (Australia) Department of Primary Industries and Fisheries. By Mary Lawrence, Dave Sully, John Beumer, and Dawn Couchman The Department of Primary Industries and Fisheries (DPI&F) in the state of Queensland, Australia, is developing a framework and guidelines for conducting an inventory of man-made, instream structures in Queensland’s declared Fish Habitat Areas. The project, “Targeted Collection of Inventory Data for Wetlands Fish Barriers in the Great Barrier Reef Catchment”, is being funded by the Australian Government’s Natural Heritage…
Notes & News
First call for oral presentations at International Marine Conservation Congress The International Marine Conservation Congress (IMCC), to occur 20-24 May 2009, has announced its first call for oral presentations, posters, and 4-minute “speed presentations”. The deadline for submissions is 15 October 2008. Details are available on the IMCC website at www2.cedarcrest.edu/imcc/proposals.html. The IMCC will encompass the Second International Marine Protected Areas Congress, and will be held in Washington, DC, in the US. WCPA – Marine launches MPA blog The World Commission on Protected Areas – Marine has launched a new web-based news platform to provide up-to-date information on the commission’s…
MPA Tip: Tracking Ships to Avoid Damage to Sensitive Areas
In “MPA Tip”, we present advice on MPA planning and management. Below, a technique for monitoring ship traffic is described. The purpose is to help avoid vessel damage to sensitive areas, such as through groundings or illegal anchoring. This tip was adapted by MPA News with permission from Duncan Vaughan, who described the technique on the Coral ListServer (http://coral.aoml.noaa.gov) in September 2007. Vaughan is the deputy clerk and fishery officer for the Eastern Sea Fisheries Joint Committee in the UK. Tip: MPAs should consider using the Automatic Identification System, or AIS, to monitor ship traffic. Since December 2004, AIS has…